Ghosts
by WriteToLive
Summary: A case leaves everyone feeling the effects, lines blurred and boundaries shifting. Starts T, will finish rated M for disturbing content and some Gene/Alex no doubt.
1. Gene

**I  
**

**London, 1982  
**

There shouldn't be any sound. It's 5am and it should be quiet. But the noise rages in his head, too many thoughts being kept awake by too little adrenaline, his muscles aching for rest even though he's perched on the bright red bonnet of his car, the only splash of colour in this pre-dawn wasteland.

A swallow brings the taste of bile; should eat something and maybe stop chain-smoking. The gum doesn't get rid of the sour taste anymore and the lamps around the scene make his eyes hurt. He'd kill for sleep.

'Guv?'

Ray's voice from the darkness and he turns his head, still buried in the collar he's turned up against the cold, chin almost on his chest. It's fucking freezing. Minus three.

'SOCO'll be here in ten minutes.'

A nod and a silence. They've done this too many times over the last month. No one has any jokes left.

'Drake?'

'Dunno, Guv.'

* * *

He watches her looking down at the dead girl, hands in his pockets. Gone are the days where he'd demand some of her psychiatry bollocks. It seems a lifetime since the first one of these. Sometimes he has to double check the calendar to make himself believe it's only been twenty seven days.

'Same as the others,' he states quietly, though this is the first time he's laid eyes on the victim. They're past _that_ question too.

It's always the same.

'Twelve,' she replies and he knows the lack of inflection in her tone is all about desperation. 'They're always twelve.'

Desperation and something else he doesn't understand. Can't think about it, there's no room. No room for anything but dead girls screams and, by now, the unmasked grip of panic.

'You alright?'

Stupid question. Stupid, pointless question. He can't think of anything else to say and she doesn't grace it with a response. The way she doesn't look at him makes him feel even more useless than he clearly already is and he doesn't have the energy to call himself a jessie for thinking it.

'I have to solve this,' he hears her say to the girl. Directly to the girl, the corpse, the once-beautiful child that is now nothing but a discarded heap of mottled and violated flesh. His mind accepts, processes and rebels about the way that she's not talking to him before he even has the chance to open his mouth, though the protest is on its way.

'_We_, Bolly.'

She's shaking her head and he watches her shoulders hunch, telling him to go away, forcing the air around her outwards until he has to take a step back.

'...parents,' he mutters, turning from her. There's nothing he can say to her and he doesn't know why but he can't, he _can't_, take her on. Sometimes she's a universe away and his arms just don't stretch that far.

* * *

He didn't do it the first time. The DCI can't break every bit of bad news and it was one girl, just one.

Didn't do the second either. She did. She _told_ him there'd be more and he didn't believe her because he didn't want to.

He's done the five since though. Every time. And it's not fair, the way the words are the same and the sobbing, desperate wails are the same and the why, why, _why?_ is the same but the hurt isn't. It should be but it isn't. It stabs worse every time, opens a well in him that fills fast with anger, and tiredness, and _sorry, I'm sorry_, and regret and helplessness. So much helplessness. He should be able to offer more, he knows. After he'd done it twice, he stopped promising they'd catch him soon even though he knows it's what they want to hear. He could help them, by promising he'd make someone pay. He could help himself if he could force his helplessness to believe it. He'd kill to be able to believe it. But it's been twenty seven days and there are no clues, no fibres, no prints, no motive. Nothing but ghosts, haunting him in the night, freezing him to the bed when he tries to sleep. Little girls, bloody and broken and screaming silently into the dark, at him, lit by the white noise shining from the television in the corner.

He tries to tell them he's sorry but it's like they just don't want to hear.

* * *

'Guv.'

He nods, a corner of his mouth raising, Scotch in his hand. Somewhere there's a drum beating, like music, like a heartbeat.

'Where've _you_ been?'

'Guv.'

Closer, the cigarette burning down between his fingers. Closer, _closer_.

'I asked you a bloody question.'

'Guv.'

Frowning now, louder, louder, _louder_. It's in his head, this drum, and it's splitting him apart.

'..._Guv!_'

'Sam!'

He sits bolt upright, his cheek hot and sweaty from lying on his desk, head stuffed full of cotton wool and whiskey. A blink and the room comes back, quiet and warm.

'Uh, no Guv. It's me.' A beat. 'Chris.'

He stares at his DC like he's never seen him before. The man is white, thinner than he was thirty days ago, hair straggling down over his collar.

'Christopher. What?'

'Uh, well, there's nothing...'

He trails off because his DCI is already waving a hand, ushering him backwards with the flick of his wrist.

'See you tomorrow but stay near a phone. Let the desk know where you'll be.'

He doesn't have to say why and Chris doesn't need to ask. He hesitates by the door though, turning around after a brief struggle with himself.

'We're uh...goin' to Luigi's if you...no.'

He's shaking his head. He hasn't been out drinking with them for a week and can't face it tonight either. As an afterthought, he asks,

'Where's Drake?'

'Left an hour ago, Guv. Didn't say where.'

The door closes and he's alone, staring down at the flat of his desk, uncluttered by paperwork because there _isn't_ any for this case. Their killer is a phantom, seemingly without touch or blood, or sweat or semen, without prints or hair, no clothes, no prior, no life.

He doesn't know how to catch a ghost. But there has to be a way. There always is. Isn't there?

* * *

She's always left on waste ground, near a dilapidated building. Usually a condemned one and God knows there are enough of those around down here. The river smells when you're this close to it; it sucks at the concrete banks caging it, the foam on top catching in his headlights. He sits in the car, looking out at her last resting place, seeing that body like _she's_ in his lights only in his head she's standing, pointing, naked and yelling.

Not for the first time this month, he's starting to really believe he's losing it. But then, he can't remember the last time he slept more than two hours at a stretch and Drake's told him enough times that the mind does funny things when it wants to.

There's music coming from somewhere, a steady rhythm that matches his footsteps as he walks. The building's been combed for evidence, no sign that their killer squatted there. He doesn't know why he knows she's in there but she's not anywhere else and she was looking at it this morning with an expression he couldn't decipher. Copper's hunch. He usually follows his instinct, except when he lets her persuade him not to.

'What do you know?' he asks her shape. He's not scared. He knows her breathing. And she doesn't seem surprised that he's here.

'I know we're not going to find him until he wants us to.'

She steps into the light of his torch, glass and grit crunching under her boots. The shadows make her cheeks hollow, blackness at the base of her throat, a living skeleton in three-inch heels and white leather jacket.

'We have to. This has to stop.'

'It's not going to.'

'That's not bloody helping.'

The back of his neck is killing him, tension from his shoulder blades to the top of his head. It's what he thinks about as her hands lay flat on his chest, that pain; he doesn't move. He's so tired that the world outside the torch beam is disappearing to black, his ears buzz with voices he can't make out, mouth dry and legs aching, her hands burning through his coat.

'Do you trust me, Gene?'

'Yes.'

'Then trust me when I tell you – you won't catch him.'

Her breath feels cold on his cheek as she breathes upwards, air ghosting over his mouth in a faint waft of peppermint and wine. In this moment, he can believe her. He doesn't want to but that doesn't mean she's not right.

'We can't just give up.'

'We won't. And he'll give himself to us.'

Her voice is muffled and he can't see her face; she's resting her cheek on his breastbone like she's listening to his heart.

'...are you alright, Bolly?'

'No.

...they're always twelve, Gene.'

'I know.'

His arm is around her shoulders but he doesn't remember moving. The torch beam lights the floor and he stares at the wall, looking at peeling paint and rotting timbers, piles of rubble in the corner half lit by the glare.

'I think there'll be five more.'

His eyes close, ears whispering to him. It takes a physical effort to pry his eyelids apart again and the world is distant when he does, like everything is a long way away and happening to someone else.

'No.'

Not that many. Please, anyone listening, not that many.

She's looking up at him and he thinks it's gone too far now, he needs sleep; when his eyes meet hers they pull at him like a vacuum, a gaping expanse of cold, glittering stars, chilling him for a split second before his hand jerks, the light moves and his imagination stops playing tricks.

'Go to bed, Gene.'

A month ago, he'd be jokingly asking her to come with him even though they both knew he was never joking at all.

'What are you doing down here, Alex?'

She never said yes.

'I'm waiting.'

Later, he thinks he should really have pressed her on that. But she'd said it as she was stepping away and he missed the warmth of her hand; he'd looked down to his chest to see if it had left a mark, imagining a hole right through to his skin. And when he'd looked back up, she was gone.


	2. Alex

**II**

She doesn't see dead twelve year old girls. She sees Molly, every time. And she'd told him she needs to solve this because she knows it's her case, knows that no one else here is going to understand. She's known it since her daughter started talking to her, and told her.

'_Never going to catch him, Mum. Are you coming home soon?'_

'_Molls...'_

'_You should sleep, you'll get wrinkles. Don't they have eye cream in 1982?'_

'_I can't sleep. I miss y...'_

'_Never mind about that. He's here. He's been to see you.'_

'_Molls?'_

But there was only a kitchen half-lit from the sitting room lamp and she's spilling the coffee granules from her spoon, melting them under her bare toes, the hem of the too-big man's shirt tickling her thigh.

* * *

It had only taken a glance to place him and gauge his state of mind; the way he hadn't approached the corpse and was sunken into his coat had told her everything she needed to know. He's giving up and he'll be lost soon, melted away under the scrutiny of a hundred pairs of eyes calling him a failure. It's unfair, it's not his fault. How could anyone solve this? But she has no space for feeling sorry for him and maybe it's even inevitable; she does, at some point, have to go home. And he's not real. None of them are real. The dead girls aren't real. Only Molly is real and what Molly tells her, that's all she can let in.

The building next to the last body hadn't helped. She'd been told to go there and wait and she had but nothing had happened. Oh, _he'd_ shown up but she'd been half expecting that anyway because he usually does at some point. After he'd left, nothing. She'll go back again tomorrow night, probably, maybe, definitely. Until then, she'll stay up and wait for her daughter.

* * *

He replaces the phone receiver and it rings again; he picks it up and says words, puts it down, hand hovering for three seconds before it rings again, picks it up, says words, puts it down. His ears buzz so loudly he can barely hear a thing but it doesn't stop the Super, the press, Ray, Chris, his mother, the next door neighbour's bloody cat from calling, walking in, saying things and leaving to make room for the next. He doesn't know how they do it. It looks busy out there, that other world that isn't this glass-walled cubicle with darts trophies on the shelf and a team picture signed by every member of the Man City 1976 League Cup winning squad, but they've got no leads so he doesn't know why.

'Should have slept last night, Guv. You're no use to anyone.'

He pours himself a Scotch. Under the desk, there's an unnamed muscle in his thigh that won't stop twitching and the alcohol is burning his throat, already raw from two packs a day for the last four weeks. Four weeks today. A lifetime.

'Fuck off, Sam.'

The matter-of-fact tone must have done the trick because when he whips his head round to the corner, there's no one there.

* * *

They've turned the radio off because no one needs to hear an hourly news bulletin calling them useless and no one's in the mood for synthesized pop. She works to the backdrop of rustling paper, people murmuring and his resigned and tired voice on the phone in the office which she hears like the rumble of tyres a mile away on a quiet road; always there, on the approach, quiet and vague until the car appears and pastes you to the tarmac.

'New profile, Bolly?'

She hadn't heard him open his door. When she looks up, his head is framed against black and white checks; for a moment, she can't make out his features.

'Half an hour.'

He nods and disappears. She stares at the ceiling until the lines between the tiles blur and mesh, like the squares have made a sky of black and white and no space for any other colour in between, stretching off into oblivion.

* * *

'She'll find the answer. She knows more than she can explain.'

'Thought I told you to fuck off.'

'Oh yeah. Sorry, Guv.'

* * *

It comes in at three in the afternoon, on the dot. They know it's real and not one of the hundreds of calls from panicked parents whose daughters have stayed too long chatting to mates after school because it's Gene's phone that rings. Members of the public aren't privy to his extension number but that doesn't seem to stop this man.

The instant the second hand ticks round and drops the long hand onto 12, it starts. People are watching. This has happened four times now. He ignores them and lifts the receiver, listening to a regular beep that he can't place.

_...beep....beep....beep...come on you bastard show yourself....beep....beep..._

There's never a voice, they can never trace the number. But it's their countdown; in precisely twelve hours, another girl will be killed. He closes his eyes, almost too weary to do this again. But they have to try, they can't just sit here and wait.

He puts the phone down and looks up to a roomful of expectant people who all look down at the floor when he nods.

'Right you lot. You know the drill. Get every copper you can lay your hands on and tell 'em they're spending tonight on watch. Ray, organise numbers and spread them over the patch, I want every single person knowing where they have to be the _instant_ they walk through the door so they can turn 'round and bloody well walk out again. Shaz, get those maps out. There has to be some waste ground around 'ere we haven't found yet. Every plod on day shift is going out in precisely five minutes to start looking for potential dumping grounds.'

No one says, because they don't need to, that finding where he's going to dump the body isn't going to stop the girl from being killed. They might _catch_ him, afterwards, but it'll be too late for the victim. He tries not to think about it. His mind started telling him a week ago that they're never going to find him when he's snatching the kid, the district is just too big, too many little girls. If he would leave any kind of clue they'd have something to go on but so far, nothing.

He stands suddenly, pushing his inadequacies away. Ten drawn faces look back at him; for the first time, he notices that hers is absent.

'I'm going to see the Chief Super. It's about time he got off his arse and got the schools closed.'

Three o clock. Surely that can't be a coincidence? If that's when he calls, they're presuming that's when he takes his next victim, after school. It only fits with three of the seven kids who've been killed and that's why no curfew or school closures have been allowed. But this has gone far enough. He has to do _something_.

'And then I'm meeting with the other London forces. Ray, you're in charge until Madam shows her face again – actually, when she does, tell her to go and wait in Luigi's for me.'

He almost says that she's completely useless at the moment anyway so she might as well fuck off home, but he stopped all that public dressing-down of his officers a few years ago. So he just picks up his coat and leaves, letting his boys get on with the work that they all know isn't going to do any good.

* * *

She wanders the streets, reading the graffiti on the walls. There's a tune under her breath that she doesn't hear, just hums along _(oh baby when you talk like that...)_ as Molly skips ahead of her, losing her from sight as she turns down an alleyway.

'Molls?'

_ (you make a woman go mad)_

'Come on, Mum!'

She rounds the corner at the end of the alley, opening onto a flat space that slopes down to the river. Molly is nowhere in sight but that slips her mind as two things register; one is that she's looking over at the O2 stadium and the other is that a man is standing with his back against the wall, leg bent and smirking, all small, wiry muscle and short hair.

There's blood on his hands.

'..._you_.'

Yeah. Hello, Alex.

'How is this...am I _home_?'

What do you think?

It looks like 2008. But he doesn't look like he belongs here and she's still wearing her white leather jacket; she's suddenly very aware of those stupid curls brushing against her cheek in the breeze, and the too-large bangles that should have been tossed as soon as the clock hit midnight January first, 1990.

'What's going on? Am I mad? Have I died? _Tell_ me.'

How should I know?

'Where's Gene?'

A shrug.

'Is it you? Are you killing those girls?'

He spreads his hands, blood dripping _(...beep...beep...beep)_ and laughs, pushing off the wall with his foot.

See you, Alex.

When she looks down the alley, there's no sign of him, or of Molly and the O2 stadium is once more a patch of empty air. She stands, looking down at the ground, until the police radio in her pocket crackles and Ray's annoyed voice can be heard.

'...go...Luigi's...for the Guv.'

She turns him off, swivels on her heel and walks. Night is drawing in and it's bitterly cold but she doesn't feel a thing. She just watches the stars, numb, head lost in the cloud of frozen breath that hangs around her face as she moves. It's a mile before she starts to cry and another before she finds she can't stop.

* * *

'Where the bloody hell is she?!'

'Dunno, Guv. I gave her your message.'

'Alright, Raymondo.' His chest hurts when he sighs, too tight from all the smoking and stress and not enough sleep. 'Get on out there and pray we find this bastard tonight. I'll find her and meet you out there.'

Ray's face says he should just forget about her but he can't do that. She's not at Luigi's obviously, not at home. He rings Evan White but he hasn't seen her – at least he can tell the man to keep Alex Price in his sight _at all times, d'you get me?_ and then there's no other place he can think of. Unless...

He never wants to see this damn place again. Why would she keep coming back here?

'Drake?'

His voice is hard and bitter, even to his own ears. He doesn't care. She can't keep doing this. Even the sound of her tears from the next room doesn't move him. He's too old, too tired. He shouldn't have to be a babysitter.

'Get up.'

She's crouching, bent in on herself, face to her knees. It looks like she's been crying for a long time and he doesn't know whether the shaking is from her sobs or the cold.

'Bloody get _up_, woman!' He drags her by the arm, too hard, too rough. She's limp and when her face turns up, there's mascara running a river down her cheeks.

'I can't. I _can't_, Gene.'

She tries to cry into his chest, he can't bear it and slaps her across the face. The leather of his glove makes a dull _thwack_ as it connects, not hard but hopefully enough to snap her out of it. She just shakes her head, hopeless; he pushes her back against the wall by her shoulders and turns her chin so she has to look at him. When she does, the angry words wither to dust in his throat. Not because he's not angry but because there doesn't seem to be any _point_. He's never understood her and he's not about to start now.

'What's _wrong?_'

'We can't stop it. He's not...from here. I don't know what he wants.'

_He's dead._

'Bollocks. Shut your mouth, Alex. ' He's thought a thousand times that he doesn't know what this man wants, doesn't know where he's from, doesn't know how to stop it. But when she spells it out he can't stop the denial, the hard, painful rage that burns up through him and spills out of his mouth.

'Shut up, just _shut up_. You're my D.I. I need you. We haven't got time to fall apart, we haven't got time for this _shit_. Just shut up you stupid fucking...'

She's kissing him, biting his lip. The peeling paint on the wall is flaking off and falling onto her shoulders like snow, like dandruff, caught in her curls and getting lost against the impossible whiteness of her leather jacket. He tastes blood and pulls back, sees himself painted on her lip like they're on a page, stuck there by the rough stroke of an uncaring child's paintbrush.

_Not like this, no, not like this._

Her body is cold under her clothes, all pointed angles and jutting bones. His gloves bump up over her ribs on the way to her tits, her leg too tight as it wraps around his waist. She weighs nothing, tastes like copper and mint and wine, too light in his arms as his bulk presses her to the bricks, too cold as he shoves inside her, her cry too loud in the empty space filled with the ghosts of dead children. He closes his eyes to block them out, block _her_ out, gasping for breath as he fights for release, to be free of all this, wanting to just be _himself_ again. She's shuddering, scraping his neck and pulling his hair, exposing her throat for his teeth, allowing him to vent his anger on her body. When she comes it's with a strained squeal that pierces him through the chest, almost hurts, almost kills him. The little death that never kills you, just traps you until you wish you hated it, hated her.

She doesn't cling to him, doesn't try to kiss him. It would be better if she did.

'We have to go.' He's tidying himself up, looking down, ashamed of himself. 'We've got to find him.'

She just shakes her head, wordless. But when he turns and starts to walk towards the car she follows him out, her white jacket shining next to his black coat, his golden hair catching the starlight and reflecting it onto her dark curls.

By the side of the house, a man watches them walk and grins, his smile too wide, teeth too bright. He makes no sound and leaves no breath in the air, a ghost with copper-red stains on his hands and stars in his eyes.


	3. Sam

**III**

He lies and stares at the ceiling above his bed, eyes following that crack that's always irked him but he's never found the time to repair. His nose is cold. He rarely puts the heating on because he isn't here enough to need it. His bedcovers are black. His carpet is cream. Many women have been surprised to find that he hangs his suits neatly on the back of the bedroom door so he remembers which ones need dry-cleaning, and doesn't just dump them in a corner. His boots go at the end of the bed and one of them has fallen over.

There is a wardrobe.

And a chest of drawers.

And a chair.

Which Sam Tyler is sitting on.

'You shouldn't be angry at them. If you fall asleep at the wheel, what do you expect?'

'There's a serial killer out there doing unspeakable things to a twelve year old girl. Doing them _right now_. You expect me to be happy about this?'

'No. But seeing as you _are_ here, maybe you should do the sensible thing and get some sleep?' He's not looking at Sam but he knows he's holding his hands up in a sarcastic gesture of surrender. He's seen it a thousand times. 'Just a suggestion.'

'I'm in bed, aren't I?'

'So you are. In bed. Talking to me.'

'Shut up and go away and I wouldn't have to.'

'Fine, fine. I just came to tell you that you know more than you think you do.'

'What's that supposed to mean? Sam?'

Sam has obviously got better at following orders these days. He always seems to disappear when he's told to. The chair is empty, accusing, and he glares at it, glassy-eyed, until the phone by his bed jumps to life, saws across his nerves like razor-wire through taut flesh.

'DCI Hunt. I'm sorry if I woke you.'

'You didn't, sir.'

'Well I should have done.'

He says nothing. The Chief Super should really have more pressing matters on his mind, he thinks, than how many hours his DCI fails to get.

'We're trying to locate D.I Drake. I don't suppose she's with you?'

Bastard.

'...I'm at home, sir. In bed. Why the hell, _sir_, would she be with me?'

'Quite so, quite so. Still, if you do happen to hear from her, please tell her to come back to the station. The troops are rather at a loss.'

He stares at the receiver in his hand for a good minute after his boss has rung off. The dial tone beeps at him, fills the room, his head, until it falls off into a continuous line of sound that hypnotises him until he can't take anymore, snaps himself out of it and slams the thing down. His shoulders have the weight of a car as he stands, muscle still twitching in his thigh, eyes unable to stop the room from blurring until he puts his hand to the wall to steady himself. A fixed point, holding him down.

Alex.

This time, he doesn't know where she'll be. But lying around here isn't helping anything and there's only four hours until another young girl dies; he was told this afternoon he was a danger to himself and others but really, he thinks, as he tucks the keys to the Quattro into the palm of his hand, there are worse things than him out there in the night. Why isn't it obvious that he needs to be catching them?

* * *

She'd watched him swing at Chris when the DC tried to take the keys off him. On a normal day, normal case...well, he wouldn't have fallen asleep and scraped the side of the Quattro down that wall. But if he had, and swung for Chris because of it, she'd have intervened and told him to stop being such a Neanderthal, that it was his own fault for driving like a pissed up crackhead, for having to be the big man, for being _him_. That's always the problem, isn't it? That he's _him_.

This time, she just watches with empty eyes and says nothing, not even glad when his misfiring depth perception means he misses his target by a good six inches. She watches when Ray pulls him away and uniform step in, radio for another car to come take him home. _Chief Super's orders Guv, I'm sorry_ and _just for a few hours_ and _we'll ring if anything happens_ and_ see you later_. She says nothing, just hugs her arms tight around her middle and looks back at him when he glances in her direction, imploring her to come over and make them see reason, that they need him here, that he needs to _be_ here and the inevitable disappointment turned anger when she looks away.

She can't help it. She looks at him and feels him in her and it hurts. That she let him, that she made him, that she didn't try to hold on to him. That for a few brief moments, she thought of him and not this.

Pssst. Alex.

She watches the dying afternoon light reflect off his hair as the car drives past, him staring resolutely forward and ignoring the unfortunate plod who has to be behind the wheel next to him.

Alex.

It's so damn cold.

_Alex_.

'What?'

She turns, tight and annoyed, letting a wisp of winter air creep under her collar, chilling all the way down her spine, pulling her skin tight, suddenly all goose bumps and sickness in the pit of her stomach.

He still has blood on his hands. It stands out on the white flesh; she notes without meaning to that there's a smudge of it on his forearm and he doesn't seem to be cold even though he's only wearing a T-shirt, no coat.

Come with me.

'Where?'

Just come.

'I can't. DCI Hunt has had to go home a...'

Yeah, yeah. Come now.

He walks away and she follows, eyes fixed on the black material he's wearing. She tries to keep up but he always seems to be moving faster; for a small man, he has a long stride. Or maybe it's just the way he walks, a distinctive swing of the hips that is all about self-contained confidence and not at all about bravado. Not like _some_ people he could mention.

The river again. The river and the bloody O2 stadium over there, gleaming at her, tantalisingly out of reach. For a split second she has to stop herself running and throwing herself into the water; her mind screams at her to swim for it, _get home_, just _move_ and who cares if she drowns on the way?

It's funny. She had thought they were miles away. It should have taken more than a few minutes to get here.

Time's a funny thing, Alex. And space. And all sorts of things.

'What do you want?'

To help you.

'Why? Why would you want to do that? Aren't you the one killing them?'

A smile; infuriating, smug.

'How are you doing this? You're _dead_.'

A laugh this time and she can't help but note, he has blood on his teeth too. It stands out in that split-wide grin, a toothpaste-ad smile, a manic, dangerous leer that roots her to the spot because it's _wrong_, he's wrong, this couldn't, can't, shouldn't be happening.

Maybe I am. Maybe you are.

'No.'

She's shaking her head too fast, too hard. Her eyes can't keep up and they hurt, bouncing around her empty skull, her mind too confused and worn to hold thoughts of what isn't in front of her.

'No, I'm _not_ dead. Molly told me I'm not. She's waiting for me to get home. I hear them telling me they've found me, they're taking the bullet out, I'm going to be well, they said so.'

The look on his face tells her he thinks she's being an idiot but is she really going to care about the opinion of a murderer?

You're slow on the uptake, Alex. Or maybe just not as well read as you think you are. So be on the lookout, yeah? Maybe you'll make the connection this time.

'What?'

Nothing. Just him looking at her.

'What? What does that _mean?_ For God's sake, you can't just...'

He can though. She made the mistake of blinking _(stupid stupid stupid)_ and he's gone again; 2008 is gone again and she's miles away from the others, here by this fucking river that swirls past with a thousand currents sucking at the trash and flotsam floating along the surface, trying its best to drag it down and mire it in the sticky, black mud at the bottom, drown it and devour it, flesh from bone until there's nothing left for anyone to find.

* * *

'ID?'

'Amanda Parker, Guv. Reported missing last night after a row with her parents. She wanted to go out, they wouldn't let her because of...'

This. Because of this.

He doesn't look at Ray, looks at the ground in front of his boots, frozen solid and grey from a month's worth of sub-zero nights. Stones and dead grass and broken glass; it swims before his vision and for the briefest of seconds, he thinks he's going to lose his 2am liquid lunch.

'Amanda Parker?'

Her voice raises his head, drags him upright; the sight of her makes him want to sink down and shove his face in his hands and not have to deal with it. Not the relief that she's here and not the weariness that comes with the knowledge that he, once again, is going to have to throw himself at the impenetrable barrier of _where have you been?_ and _what the hell is the matter with you anyway, you unbearable pain in my arse? _

And then he says neither of those things and doesn't sit down and tries to hope that that tone in her voice means something useful and is not just another of her baffling meanderings.

'You know her?'

'No. But the name is familiar.'

Ray's looking at her too but there doesn't seem to be any more forthcoming. He looks at the ground again, balls his hands to fists in his coat pockets.

'Where have you been? The Chief Super called me.'

'Following a lead.'

'We have a lead?'

'Dead end.'

'Of course.'

She walks away towards the body and he lifts his eyes to watch. And then they narrow, his brow creasing as she crouches, his eyes taking in her eyes looking into the glass-wide stare of the latest twelve year old corpse.

She's different.

'Bolly, what is it?'

'There's no building here. Every other girl, waste ground and a dilapidated building. Why not this one?'

'Because we were watching all the abandoned buildings on waste ground in the city?'

Ray's contribution and, he thinks, a valid enough one.

'I don't think that would have stopped him. It hasn't for the last few and this is an organised crime, planned, methodical. He's not going to deviate from it. He's doing this for a _reason_.'

'Yeah, you told us that after the second. And that was six little girls ago Drake and we're still no closer to catching the bastard.'

A month ago, that would have had more venom. But he can't summon it, there's just nothing left. He turns away, aching at the thought of facing another set of parents. It's 5am and they'll have been up all night – would it be kinder to let them hope for another hour or two, at least until the sun comes up, yes, surely?

He gets into the car. He'll never put it off, kinder or no. Because this sort of news needs to be delivered in the dark, in the pre-dawn dregs of night; it's not the sort of thing you want to hear after breakfast on a clear, sunny winter's day. When you look back you want to remember the darkness, how you hated it, the fear in your gut and the wet handkerchief wringing in your palm; you want to rail against how the sun managed to rise on the first day of the rest of your life without your daughter existing in it. _Yesterday we were parents,_ you'll say. _And today, we are not_.

It keeps the dark for crying and the light for mending. And then maybe, on another night, you'll suffer as you let go and then the sun can rise on a day where the pain has become bearable enough to let you move on.

He knows this. He's been doing this job a long fucking time. He's seen it a hundred times, more. He can do this.

But he's never been so damn glad to have her open the door and slide into the passenger seat, in that way she has that brooks no argument. So damn glad that he doesn't have to do more than look at her to say _thanks_ and have her nod in return. _I know._

* * *

'Amanda was...everything. Our miracle. Our little miracle.'

He fights to keep his eyes up, his face set in sympathy and resolve, his voice even and low. The same words, always the same words.

'I'm very sorry, Mrs. Parker. Very sorry.'

More sorry than you'll ever know.

'Will you catch him, Mr. Hunt? Before there are...any more.'

'We're doing everything in our power. We won't ever give up.'

His hand is shaking, nerves out of control under his skin. She'd offered to break the news but he won't shirk the responsibility. It's the very least these parents deserve. And the woman is nodding, shredding a tissue with her fingers, staring down at her lap while her husband remains crumpled in a threadbare armchair, seemingly part of the grey and green patches, no life left in him. He wants so badly to leave but there's a cup of tea that's too hot to drink and it wouldn't be polite to leave it, not when the woman insisted, even after she knew that she'd never see her daughter again. They did stay up all night, the heating is on. He thinks he might roast alive in his overcoat and it's made worse by the way Drake doesn't seem to be suffering the same way. No sweat on _her_ brow.

'That's a beautiful drawing, Mrs. Parker.'

She's indicating a picture on the mantel, a simple sheet of plain A4 showing a beautiful house, elegant in its detail, a work of art.

'Yes. Amanda...'

There are more tears and from the corner, a groan like a dying animal.

'...she always wanted to be an architect.'

He thought he'd feel better once they left. But no, because now they're back to where they were, waiting for the next one. The car leaves a plume of exhaust fumes behind as he hits the accelerator, desperate to get away but dreading what this new dawn will bring.

* * *

'Parker. _Parker_.'

You really are exceedingly dense sometimes, Alex. And after I went to the trouble to make it easy for you.

He's in her _flat_. Here. _Here_. This tiny kitchen isn't made to hold the ghosts of dead men, especially not one with that much blood on them.

What's the matter? Brain not making connections?

He's tapping his temple, jabbing his finger at it, face screwed up like he's sympathising but sarcastic, so sarcastic. And she can't stop the squeal even though she knows it's a bad idea.

Come with me.

'No. I _can't_. And you never tell me anything anyway.'

The fear is so strong she can taste it in her mouth. But it's like a drug, like hope she can't bear to let go of. If he knows something, anything...

'Go _away_.'

A shake of the head, disappointed. She's let him down. But by some miracle, a second passes and he's no longer there.

'Who're you talking to?'

Holding a mug, and passing over another one, is a good way to mask the shake in your hands. Managing a wan sort of smile is more of an effort but she tries, and hopes he's too distracted to notice the colour of her skin.

'Myself. There's something bothering me about that girl.'

_Besides the fact she was twelve and mutilated almost beyond recognition? _

Gene knows better than to say it. Just waits because she's got that look, like she had at the scene, when something's going on, something's different.

'Parker. Architect. There was a...'

He sees the expression die in her eyes.

'...nothing. I was misremembering.'

He looks down at the floor. For a second there, he almost remembered what hope felt like.

'I should go.'

He doesn't move and nor does she.

'You should sleep, Gene.'

How?

'You too.'

He meets her eyes and it's so quiet here, the roaring of blood in his ears fades to an echo and the light is too bright for his eyes but for a moment, it stops hurting and...yes, there. _That's_ what it feels like. But then she's looking away and is embarrassed and then so is he so he straightens and puts the cup down and picks his coat up instead.

'See you later.'

She wishes he'd have waited around to see her nod but the door has clicked shut and a cackle of laughter is exploding her ears, making her jump hard enough to drop her tea. A breath later and he's close enough that she should be able to feel his breath on her cheek but there's nothing, just his face an inch from hers, forcing her to stare into the starry abyss of those eyes that glitter in ways that nothing on earth ever should.

By the river. The _river_, Alex. Amanda Parker.

'But...she's dead.'

I'm flattered that you noticed.

'No. I mean. She was alive. She built that building...' By the river. Jesus Christ, that river. Opposite where the O2 stadium now stands in 2008. Right where she was, where this _thing_ has taken her twice now.

'She's not twelve though. She's an architect. She...she disappeared in 2006 and she wasn't twelve. She was in her thirties.'

Fear tightens your throat, makes it hard to breathe. And he doesn't back away. It's almost worse when you know you should be able to smell him, and his breath, and his clothes and you can't.

Yes. What a coincidence. I chose her for a _reason_, Alex.

'Tell me. I don't understand, _please_.'

Did you think we were the only ones?

'...yes.'

He's backing away, shaking his head, contemptuous. If it weren't for those eyes, he'd look normal. T-shirt, jeans, scuffed trainers. Slim, wiry, solid.

'I don't know what you expect me to do. What do I _do_?'

He sneers, wipes his hand across his face and leaves a bloody moustache like he's a kid playing dress-up, painting his face like a red Indian.

You'll figure it out, Alex. You'll have to.

Deep breath. _I am in control._

'And if I can't?'

For a moment, nothing. And then his face splits once more, a grin that maybe once, in another life, was cheeky and cute and not horrifying, the way it is now. She wonders what went wrong, what happened, how he can be here and be dead in two other places at the same time but when it comes down to it, Sam Tyler has always been something of a mystery, hasn't he?

'Sam? If I can't?'

I wouldn't want to ruin the surprise, Alex. But if you're anxious for spoilers I can tell you this...

His hand on her throat is cold, makes her gasp.

_...you won't like it._

She has to close her eyes to stop herself screaming, to stem the boil of panic that starts to rise through her. His hand is cold and he's laughing again, hurting her ears and she can smell the blood and...

...when she opens her eyes, the sun is coming through the window and she stands in her kitchen, alone, only the echoes of laughter in her head to prove that he was ever here at all.


End file.
